We are planning on starting fundraising with expats and Westerners, but
why don’t Chinese locals donate? Everyone knows there are TONS of
super-rich locals. Why don’t they feel obligated to help their own
country? Why should Westerners pay all the money?

Culturally, there isn’t the pressure to give, the guilt of not giving, probably
stemming from Christianity in the West. In the East, it’s take care of
your family.

There’s the traditional lack of stability. In the
West, if you have $X millions in the bank, your relatively sure your
future, and maybe even the future of your next few generations, is
taken care of. But this is changing quickly - especially with offshore
accounts

In China, rich people don’t like to get on the
Forbes Richest list. They like to stay anonymous. One, they get hit up
by tons of relatives. Second, who knows where that money really came
from.

Finally, China doesn’t give tax breaks for donations. In
fact, there are very few non-profits you can even donate too! A
hypothetical question: if US did not make donations tax deductible, how
charitable would US citizens be?